


come morning light

by Pond_Melody



Series: Tumblr Ficlets [1]
Category: Mission: Impossible (Movies)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fluff, Hurt Benji, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Injury Recovery, Lots of Angst, M/M, Protective Ethan, Scars, Title May Be Changed, it's my brand y'all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-04-08
Packaged: 2020-01-06 14:24:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18390203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pond_Melody/pseuds/Pond_Melody
Summary: You'll be alrightNo one can hurt you now





	come morning light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [snovyda](https://archiveofourown.org/users/snovyda/gifts), [Kerry_0506](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kerry_0506/gifts).



> Written a few years ago, inspired by the following scenario:
> 
> "Imagine Ethan and Benji being captured, and Ethan is being told to hurt Benji (to hit or cut him), otherwise their captors will just shoot Benji dead."
> 
> Title is an excerpt from Taylor Swift's "Safe and Sound".

The scars line his ribs, none of them any longer than half the width of his chest. Instead, they each meet their counterparts in the middle, in a sort of grotesque seam that runs down the length of his breastbone. The pattern stops above his navel, but the scars snake around his sides and onto his back. Smaller, deeper marks travel the length of his spine, and Ethan still hasn’t quite shaken the fear that they wouldn’t tell him to stop soon enough, before the blade could damage his body in ways that would never heal. 

They litter his arms, which are mostly concealed by his sleeves, but the white lines closest to his hands, like the ones on his collarbones, always manage to creep into sight from underneath the fabric. Ethan realizes with a pang that Benji has favored long sleeved, high collared shirts since he was released from the hospital. 

His Benji. His brilliant, sweet Benji. 

Ethan watches him sleep, trying to take comfort in the gentle rise of his belly with every breath. 

 _Still breathing,_ Ethan has had to remind himself in the middle of most nights for the better part of two months, even the nights that he sat next to his hospital bed.  _Still breathing. Still here._

Times like these, with Benji fast asleep in his arms, are the only times that Ethan could inspect his scars up close and really look at the damage he’d done to his partner’s body. He’s getting a little better at not letting it make him sick to his stomach.

Ethan remembers those nights spent sitting at his side much too well. The gauze that covered his otherwise bare chest, the leads that monitored his heartbeat, the occasional whimper that would escape his lips. Ethan whispered apologies to him every night as he stroked his hair. Sometimes, he was present enough to mumble that it wasn’t his fault, now shut up. Most of the time, he slept through it. Either way, Ethan knew better. 

His t-shirt has ridden up in his sleep, exposing his navel and the scars that surround it. Ethan traces the white lines with a gentle fingertip, trying not to count them, trying not to obsess over them. He’s not doing a very good job.

Benji stirs in his arms, sleepily swatting Ethan’s hand away before tugging his shirt down to cover the bare skin. Ethan’s hand hovers for a moment before coming to rest on his stomach. Benji’s hand gently grasps Ethan’s and guides it to his upward instead. He places Ethan’s hand on his sternum, just over his heart, and places his own hand atop Ethan’s with a clumsy pat. Ethan presses down lightly, just hard enough to feel the thump of Benji’s heart against his palm.

“Stop that,” Benji mumbles.

“Hm?” Ethan says, making to lift his hand from Benji’s rib cage, afraid that he’d hurt him. Benji’s hand, however, holds it there.

“Brooding.”

Ethan says nothing. Benji had asked him, almost pleaded for him not to blame himself, and he’s getting better, but he still finds himself being startled awake by memories of Benji's cries as his ribs crack beneath Ethan’s boots, his wrists and fingers breaking in Ethan’s hands, choking as the heel of Ethan’s hand presses into his trachea.

Benji is aware that he doesn’t remember as much from the ordeal as Ethan does, something that became evident almost as soon as he’d woken up in the hospital. They’re not sure how much of that is because of the head trauma (which Ethan had suffered from too, but not to the same degree), and how much of it he’d simply repressed.

He’d asked Ethan not to blame himself, but he doesn’t remember begging him to make the pain stop,  _please make it stop,_ to let their captors kill him,  _please, Ethan, it hurts_. He doesn’t remember lashing out at Ethan when he refused and Ethan  _letting_  him, taking the punches easily until all he had the strength to do was slump against him and cry.

Benji doesn’t remember being dead for eleven minutes, although Ethan doesn’t remember that either–he was being treated for his own injuries at the time. He hadn’t been told that Benji’s heart stopped (twice, for five minutes in the emergency room and almost six on the operating table) until later, when Benji was stable and recovering. Ethan is grateful, at least, that he was still unconscious and hadn’t had to witness the panic attack that followed.

Ethan wiggles so that he’s lower, removes his hand from Benji’s chest and lays his head there instead. There’s a lump forming in his throat, but Benji’s heartbeat never fails to soothe him. Benji’s fingers tangle in his hair. He tries not to be disgusted with himself, that Benji still has to comfort him after all of this, when it should be the other way around. 

“You know it wasn't your fault."

Ethan knows that he’ll fall apart completely if he tries to speak, so he keeps his mouth shut and buries his face in Benji’s chest, who runs his fingers through Ethan’s mop of hair waits as he waits patiently for him to say something or fall back asleep. Ethan’s tears are beginning to soak though the thin fabric of his shirt. 

He doesn’t understand how Benji can look him in the eye every day and tell him he loves him, how night after night, he can hold him so calmly and assure him that he doesn’t blame him for what happened.

“Ethan,” he says, “I’m alive because of you.”

Alive with migraines, dizzy spells, and a medical alert bracelet in case he has a seizure in the grocery store. Alive with neurologist, therapy, and physical therapy appointments every week. Alive because Ethan was too selfish to take his pain away, because if he’d let Benji die, he would have died, too. Benji was alive because Ethan had made him live through hell.

Ethan finally sobs against Benji’s chest, ashamed, because if they had to endure this again, he knows he wouldn’t change any of his decisions. He will always force Benji to keep breathing for as long as it takes, as long as he possibly can.

“I’d do it again, if I had to,” he confesses, his voice slightly muffled. “I’d put you through it again, if I knew that you’d still be alive when it was all over. I don’t want to live without you.”

Benji rubs circles on his back, soft and slow, and shushes him gently. "Shh, it's alright. I love you. It's alright." 

“I’m sorry.” He sobs again, harder this time. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

Benji matches each apology with an, “I know you are,” or, “It wasn’t your fault,” and continues to rub his back while Ethan fights to get his breathing under control. He can’t quite manage it.

He’s the reason that Benji couldn’t feed himself for two weeks because his fingers couldn’t grip the spoon. He’s the reason that Benji becomes frustrated with himself for being unable to find the words he wants to use. He’s the reason that Benji, without even really knowing why, becomes uneasy when watching him handle cutlery.

Ethan doesn’t regret refusing to let Benji die, but that decision had altered his partner’s life forever.

He doesn’t regret his decision, but that doesn’t mean he’ll ever be able to forgive himself for it.  

 

**Author's Note:**

> I read this before posting, but have only now realized that the tenses get a little sketchy. I will fix that soon.


End file.
